Cultivating Healthy Animators

A lifetime of animating is only possible if you develop healthy habits early.

Now is the time of the semester when students (and instructors) might start feeling the physical effects of hours upon hours of intense work. I think some of you can already attest to the fact that Repetitive Stress Injuries are a real risk. When I was in grad school, I began having horrible pains in my wrists. Cortisone shots, physical therapy, and wrist braces did nothing to alleviate the pain. I had to stop using the computer for 3 months and only then was my body able to heal, but I still have to be aware of my working ergonomics, or it starts to come back!

Mental health is important too. The end of the semester stress can trigger anxiety attacks depression and exhaustion. I have had students disappear during finals, fail to turn in their projects. When I see them next semester, they resignedly tell me they just got overwhelmed by all the projects, or had a mental breakdown. Sometime just knowing the instructor cares about their state of mind can help a student hang on during a rocky period.

This week I spent the first half of class going through the points below. One student (a senior) told me I was the only professor that had ever talked about being healthy during finals. I don’t want to be the only one! Have these conversations. Being mindful of how you work, both physically and mentally, will help you manage the intense periods and set up up with good habits for a long life of healthy animation.

Track your time

Knowing how long an animation project will take you is a skill acquired through experience and discipline. When I started doing freelance work, I didn’t have a clue how much to charge for a 30 second logo animation or a 2 minute segment of documentary animation. Clients would ask for a cost estimate, which means I had to estimate how many hours I would spend on their project and multiply that by a liveable hourly rate that would cover my overhead and expenses.

I started using a time tracking service to categorize the time I spent on projects and also how much time I spent on other art and business related stuff (applying for grants, sending emails back and forth to clients — all the mundane stuff that sucks away our time without us realizing it!) I wish I had done this in school because I would have started out in business with a much better sense of how long it takes to animate certain things.

There are lots of apps out there to help you do this! I use Paymo*, which has a free version that allows for 3 different projects and an unlimited tasks assigned to each project. This works well for academia because I have Teaching, Research, and Service as my “Projects” and then can assign different tasks under those projects to be more precise about where my time is going (e.g. Under “Service, I list each committee I’m on as its own separate “Task”; under “Teaching” I have tasks like Grading, Classroom Time, Course Prep, Advising, etc.)

When tackling a long day of work, using the Pomodoro Technique helps maximize your efficiency and schedule mini-breaks to reset your focus and get up and move (see next section). You can use this to track your time too, but just need to manually enter in your “tomatoes” into a Google Spreadsheet or other doc.

After my lecture on healthy work habits, I pulled up this very cute, animated tomato timer and we all worked on our projects in 25 minute spurts, taking a 5 minute stretch break after each tomato. It was a great success! I think because we did it in class, more of them will actually make use of this technique on their own.

*I don’t necessarily promote Paymo as the “best” app. It’s just what I happened to start using when I was freelancing and didn’t want to switch when I started teaching.

Get up and move

As someone who is constantly managing RSI, I can’t stress how important it is to move your body in order to protect it! The tomato timer is great because you can train yourself to stand up every 25 minutes and do a few stretches before going back to work. Smart watches and phone health apps now also have this feature. Clearly the research says we should be moving more than our modern lives require.

One thing I’ve found very helpful in managing my RSI is to change up my working position. I’ve tried a lot of things in crafting my perfect studio. I have a sit/stand desk from IKEA that lets me work part of the day standing. I do a lot of work on a Cintiq Touch, which keeps my hands away from the mouse (the main source of RSI problems for me). I try to spend part of my day sitting on an exercise ball, to build core strength.

Most students don’t have the resources for all these studio gadgets, but they do have one thing — laptops! Laptops enable you to change your work environment frequently. Spend an hour working at a desk, then move to the couch for a bit. Find a place on campus with a counter that’s ideal for standing while you work. Working in different body positions distributes the stress on your joints and tendons so that nothing gets overworked. And don’t forget those 5-minute breaks to get up and move!

Things to do during your 5 minute break:

• Do these hand and wrist stretches
• Try some cartoon yoga
• Walk to the window and look at something far away
• Drink a glass of water
• Do a lap around the building (inside or out)

Encourage students to check in with each other

As teachers, we can reach out to students who seem to be having a hard time, but we don’t have the ability to keep track of everyone on a very personal level. Friends and classmates are much more aware of what’s going on in each other’s lives and can be a huge encouragement to students struggling with stress, depression, and anxiety. That’s why it’s important they look out for each other.

• If you don’t see a classmate for a while, check up on them with a text or stopping by their dorm. Make sure they are ok and know that someone cares. If you are really worried about their mental state, offer to go to the counseling center with them.
• If you know a friend is sick, check in with them, just to make sure they are OK and not getting worse. (Seriously, people die of the flu!)
• Have a study session or work session for your project. Being around other people working can be energizing. Plus you can problem solve together, get a second opinion on your color choices, and encourage one another to get to the finish line!
• If you are feeling completely overwhelmed, or if something personal is seriously interfering with your ability to finish your work, please, please contact your professor about it. There may be resources on campus or alternative options that you don’t know about. We care about you, and want you to succeed!

This was a great conversation with my class this semester and I actually noticed that the energy level and attitude of the class collectively jumped a lot this week. Feel free to share this post or use it as a guide for your own students. Happy finals everyone!